Poker maths, railbirding, and the value of poker forums
Three great ways to accelerate your poker skills
WEAPONS OF MATHS DESTRUCTION Yes. I want the “poker committed” among you to join my new subversive organisation known among its secretive hooded membership as “Algebra”. More seriously let me give you an example why your ability to juggle simple mental maths is important for you to work on all the time. You’re faced with a $20 call into a $100 pot. The odds against you making your hand in this case are three-to-one. Quickly you should be able to see those are positive numbers. In one hundred games under those circumstances you would probably lose your $20 seventy five times and win the $100 twenty five times. Winnings of $2,500 less losses of $1,500 means over the long run by watching your odds you’d be $1,000 up over the long run. Speedy, simple calculations give you an edge that’s worth honing.
GOTTA LOVE THIS TECHNOLOGY Poker is very much like football in that playing it is great fun and watching the truly big games is also great fun. Unfortunately only a very few of the really exciting poker tournaments or celebrity games end up on television. The real opportunity to enjoy the thrill of spectating is now being delivered by the very technology which has launched poker into everyone’s front room: The World Wide Web. If you have a “poker client” and an internet connection these days you can “railbird” some of the most entertaining games of poker in the world.
CHECK OUT POKER FORUMS Poker forums are full of details in their chattering chat boxes of big event games enabling you to take a virtual ringside seat with very little advance warning. There are reliable statistics showing that as the huge numbers of online poker players gain yet more momentum the desire to spectate for entertainment and educational purposes is climbing at the same rate. New players are realising that time invested in watching Poker Gods dual to their financial death across the felt is one of the fastest and most exciting ways to pick up the skills required to improve their own online efforts. Big name celebrity players going at one another online are the number one favourite attractions among railbirds, largely because the buy-ins are too high for the average player and so spectating becomes the only way to be involved in the high stakes thrills for free. There’s also the voyeuristic pleasure of watching someone else squirm as they lose thousands of dollars without the actual pain being inflicted on one’s own funds. It’s gladiatorial and the closest the poker universe gets to the Ultimate Fighting Championships. This sport doesn’t rain on you and you don’t need an expensive season ticket either.
